The mother of all burgers

History lives on as Jobe’s Country Boy Drive-In comes back to life

It’s easy to find the mother of all burgers on The Mother Road. Set on Highway 66 in El Reno, Jobe’s Country Boy Drive In is a much-loved haunt for onion burger and char burger aficionados.

Folks from Canadian Valley Electric Cooperative and Oklahoma Electric Cooperative and many locales across the state come to Jobe’s to enjoy an old-fashioned char burger and reminisce about times long past.

Mike Mathews said he and his wife, Ginger, have frequented Jobe’s since the early ‘70s. He remembers coming “when I was old enough to ride my bike down here with money in my pocket.”

His story is not unique. Ann Seibel grew up in El Reno and said she has many fond memories of Jobe’s.

“It was the hangout and drag place in El Reno,” Seibel said, adding that she and her teenaged friends would cruise the strip multiple times in an evening, “Maybe 100 times a night. We’d stop only to get gas. We could take up a collection of 25 cents from everyone in the car to get gas.”

Seibel said she learned to back a car at Jobe’s.

“You’d back into the parking stalls and order over a speaker. A car hop would bring your food out. It was important to reverse park so you could see everyone driving by and honking.”

And so it goes with stories from loyal customers.

J.R. Jobe opened the restaurant in 1958 and introduced the char burger which became an instant classic. When Robert Sanders bought the restaurant in 1969, he kept the char burger on the menu.

Sanders explained with a chuckle that kids would pull their hot rods into the parking lot and fight over the best parking place. He tells stories from when he owned Jobe’s: tales about folks getting married and coming to Jobe’s to eat dinner and having to split a burger because that’s all they could afford. He said once, Elvis drove through the parking lot.

In 2015, Sanders retired. Jobe’s fixtures were auctioned off and the building was turned into a small museum. But folks missed Jobe’s.

“We were sad when they closed,” said patron Ginger Mathews. “We’ve always come here. I can’t remember not coming. It’s a landmark in El Reno. There’s nothing anywhere like it.”

Fast forward to 2024 when Eric Hughes decided to buy Jobe’s and turn it back into a restaurant.

“I couldn’t have done it without Robert,” Hughes said of bringing Jobe’s back. “When I learned about the history of this place, I wanted to reopen it.”

Hughes and Sanders recounted story after story about Jobe’s. With nostalgia so thick you’d have to sweep it away with your hand, Hughes glanced at Sanders, grinned and said, “See him tearing up? That’s how much he loves this place. Robert is like a second father to me. I couldn’t have done it without him. If I didn’t have the history and following behind Jobe’s I wouldn’t have done it. I couldn’t have done it. If it had been a rinky-dink place, I don’t think El Reno would have supported it, but with this history and people supporting it, it’s coming back. I want it to be a destination not only for El Reno, but for all of Oklahoma.”

Hughes has been loyal to Sanders’ menu. He makes the same char sauce which he simmers for hours before slathering it on a bun then grilling it to perfection and adding a hamburger patty for a mouth-watering sensation. Hughes also serves onion burgers, as well as onion rings, fried green tomatoes and other classics. He’s started to offer breakfast and hopes to bring back pizza in the future.

Meanwhile, Hughes intends to participate in the annual El Reno Fried Onion Burger Day Festival where he said local burger restaurants will likely make and serve 500 burgers each. The town’s fire department will cook the world’s largest fried onion burger, weighing more than 850 lbs. The festival offers games, clowns, magicians, live entertainment, a car and motorcycle show, vendor booths and a burger eating contest.

“Burgers put El Reno on the map,” Lyndsay Bayne, public information officer and marketing manager for the city of El Reno said. “People come from all over the world to eat at our four famous burger joints.”

Bayne said the overall annual economic impact of El Reno’s non-corporate burger restaurants is at least $2.6 million.

The festival is set for May 3 this year and Jobe’s will be a big part of it.